One World One Dream
This is the government’s dream for China: nice and shiny apartment buildings as symbol for a prosperous economy - wealth for everyone!
Of cause until now, only a very few can afford such luxury apartments (shown here the Palms Springs complex). Those flats cost hundreds of thousands Euro.
Beijing is a city of unbelievable contrasts: only one kilometer away from the “Palm Springs” apartment complex you find an area with muddy, unpaved roads and small brick-built houses. Obviously it is a poor neighborhood, where people do the cooking in front of their shacks and most of the life takes place on the street.
Isn’t it sheer mockery, that an extra large advertisement is telling about the glorious future these people soon will be looking at - but without being part of it!
"One World One Dream" is written there - a cynical message for those guys…
This is Mr. Wang. Mister Wang owns a small bar in the neighborhood. Actually it is nothing more than a shack with an improvisational bar counter an a fridge.
He has been living here all his life, has seen many changes and soon this place will be destroyed for a dream which isn’t his one.
This is Mrs. Lee. She is preparing tonight’s dinner together with her kids and her sister. For now everything looks peaceful, except the gloomy concrete skeletons of the new apartment area in the background. She might also ask herself, of who’s dream she is part of…
This is Mister Cheng. He thought his years of retirement would turn out to be relaxed and quiet. But instead he cannot overhear the every day’s construction noise from the building site in the background. The government’s future seems to be at his doorsteps, only a stone’s throw away - and he won’t be part of it.
He’s got no illusions that sooner or later his small house will be torn off. Nobody will care about the fact, that it is his own property. It will proceed as always in those cases: some money and a small apartment in the suburbs will be offered… no change to refuse…
One World - One Nightmare